Grouped with such street narcotics as heroin and LSD, the sleeping pill Rohypnol (flunitrazepam), has been circulating in the underground club scene and wreaking havoc on America. The powerful compound, considered to be 10 times stronger than valium, is being used increasingly by young Americans, especially in Florida and Texas, and has been cited in cases of date rape.
On Tuesday, the United States government banned imports of the sedative, but just like other illegal substances, its importation and use will just be hidden and the effects of this substance are potentially more dangerous than even cocaine or heroin.
Just like any drug, Rohypnol is more dangerous when taken with alcohol. According to Dr. David E. Smith, Dr. Donald R. Wesson and Sarah Calhoun, in an unpublished study, the sleeping pill, also known as La Rocha, Roofies and the Forget Pill on the streets, is only occasionally taken alone as a primary intoxicant. It is more often used with alcohol and/or marijuana, which “reduces the safety margin and is more likely to be lethal due to enhanced central nervous system depression.” Rock star Kurt Cobain used it in a suicide attempt a few months before his death.
The danger lies even deeper than impaired judgement. “The effects of flunitrazepam are fairly long-acting. With a one milligram dose, blood levels peak one to two hours after ingestion, and fall to one-half their peak after 16 to 35 hours.” A less potent dose of the drug lasts even longer. This prolonged affect does not simply result in a “sleepy, drunk” feeling, it results in total incoherence.
According to Channel 4 news, “one tab mixed with alcohol can leave a grown woman incapacitated, with no memory of what happened the next morning.”
The real danger behind these prolonged blackouts is that they create the perfect opportunity for an incident of date rape to occur.
The date slips a one or two milligram tablet into his or her companion’s beer or wine cooler at a bar and they are literally knocked out. Four Florida men have already been convicted of rape after committing such acts with dates that they drugged with Rohypnol, according to the Los Angeles Times.
The initial reaction to Rohypnol is that it is just a sleeping pill like any other on the market. The flaw in this philosophy is that Rohypnol, unlike over-the-counter sleeping agents, has no therapeutic value.
“It has no medicinal value that cannot be met with existing pharmaceuticals licensed to be used in this country,” said Robert Rudin, U.S. Treasury secretary, about the drug.
In other words, there is no purpose for the drug within U.S. borders, yet at one point “the drug could be brought into the United States by visitors from abroad in relatively small amounts for their own use, but that is now forbidden and the substance will be confiscated at the border,” according to Reuters.
A recent Drug Enforcement Agency study revealed that 101,000 tablets were brought into the country over the Texas border last July. This is no small amount, but once again the government promises to “no longer permit this drug to enter the country,” said Rudin.
U.S. Custom Service Commissioner George Weiss took a stand and said, “Rohypnol has been called a party drug of today. Well, the party is over.”
This sounds like what the government said about all illegal narcotics entering the U.S., but we still have mass smuggling rings and drug abuse that plagues America’s streets.
The government’s inability to stop circulation and the immense danger that lies in Rohypnol consumption make it even more important to awaken the nation to the sleeping pill. A person may not choose to take the pill for its “disinhibitory” effects, but when it is slipped in his or her drink, there is no telling what might happen.
